Between knowledge and power: Understanding how international organisations see migration

Antoine Pécoud (University of Paris 13) critically analyses the reports produced by international organisations on migration, shedding light on the way these actors frame migration and develop their recommendations on how it should be governed Migration has become, since the nineties, the subject of growing international discussion and cooperation. International organisations and the international community have taken a number of initiatives to better ‘manage’ migration and make it the object of ‘global governance’ mechanisms. This implies a specific intellectual and political construction of migration as a global issue that would deserve international attention. This calls for critically analysing the reports produced by international organisations on migration, and for shedding light on the way these actors frame migration and develop their recommendations on how it should be governed. In contrast to the dominant representations in many receiving countries, international migration narratives develop a positive appreciation of migration, viewed as a normal feature of a globalising world and as a central element in development strategies. But this optimism comes along a depolitisation of migration that obscures the contribution of international actors to contemporary political debates.